THE MISSOURI RIVER JOURNALS 



141 



tended more than six or seven feet beyond this. I was 

 disappointed at not finding nests, or rooms for stores. 

 AlthouL^h I have said much about Buffalo running, and 

 butchering in general, I have not given the particular 

 manner in which the latter is performed by the hunters of 

 this country, — I mean the white hunters, — and I will now 

 try to do so. The moment that the Buffalo is dead, three 

 or four hunters, their faces and hands often covered with 

 gunpowder, and with pipes lighted, place the animal on 

 its belly, and by drawing out each fore and hind leg, fix 

 the body so that it cannot fall down again ; an incision is 

 made near the root of the tail, immediately above the root 

 in fact, and the skin cut to the neck, and taken off in the 

 roughest manner imaginable, dov.nwards and on both 

 sides at the same time. The knives are going in all 

 directions, and many wounds occur to the hands and fin- 

 gers, but are rarely attended to at this time. The pipe 

 of one man has perhaps given out, and with his bloody 

 hands he takes the one of his nearest companion, who has 

 his own hands equally bloody. Now one breaks in the 

 skull of the bull, and with bloody fingers draws out the 

 hot brains and swallows them with peculiar zest; another 

 has now reached the liver, and is gobbling down enor- 

 mous pieces of it ; whilst, perhaps, a third, who has come 

 to the paunch, is feeding luxuriously on some — to me — 

 disgusting-looking offal. But the main business proceeds. 

 The flesh is taken ofif from the sides of the boss, or hump 

 bones, from where these bones begin to the very neck, 

 and the hump itself is thus destroyed. The hunters give 

 the name of " hump " to the mere bones when slightly cov- 

 ered by flesh ; and it is cooked, and very good when fat, 

 young, and well broiled. The pieces of flesh taken from 

 the sides of these bones are called filets, and are the best 

 portion of the animal when properly cooked. The fore- 

 quarters, or shoulders, are taken off, as well as the hind 

 ones, and the sides, covered by a thin portion of flesh 



